This is kind of interesting since Blue Cross of all the major carriers is participating big time with the exchanges and now wants consumers to call them direct. Yesterday thought it really got bad with HHS and CMS not being honest about all the code being written for the “financial transactions” being even started. I had my rant with that and why they chose to write code from the bottom up with a short time frame is beyond me. I guess this must have come out when Sebelius sat down and had the site crash on her in Florida, but she’s got bees in her bonnet and dislikes technology anyway, body language and speeches say it all.

Now in addition to all the complexities of insurance and let’s not forget who created a lot of them, insurers, they now to bring in their Quants to create new “math business models” just like the banks and hedge funds use. Look at the classifieds, more insurers now are hiring “Quants”…how many actuaries write C++ or Python? That’s what this takes to develop “insurer profit models”. I explain a lot of this and there’s my Algo Duping video page as well that shows exactly what Quants do. Subprime anyone? It could not have occurred without Quants and the models so same thing going on here and there are good models that we all need and use too, but keep in mind there’s always that other side and it did show it’s big ugly face during subprime. I think everyone should be exposed to the truth and methodologies used and you don’t have to be a mathematician but rather just understand the processes and how servers running 24/7 make life impacting decisions about all of use and make other even richer.

Nobody has ever been asked to be accountable for their math either..way over what the government can do it seems and I keep saying the Feds should hire an army of quants so they know what goes on with the other side. We have useless folks like Richard Cordray that is building a data base so he can learn…we don’t have time for that either. BD

Dark Arts of Mathemical Deception

Professor Charlie Siefe of NYU, a mathematician debunks clinical trials, and few other items to where data is spun and fools you, every day example, hear about the perfect butt algorithm and more. These are probably some things you have never thought about but again after listening to what he has to say, it’s time to think about being skeptical. Here’s a radio show that also talks about the same topics.

This video digs in a bit further with how fictitious business models are used by banks and companies do this too. The models are so complex that CEOs don’t even understand them. “Quants, The Alchemists of Wall Street will take you through how “math models” work at banks and financial institutions in a way that even the layman can understand. More videos like over at theAlgo Duping/Killer Algorithm Page. Bank of America will also tell you“IT’ is a business” how they make money.

Weapons of Math Destruction

This is a lecture where Kathy O’Neill, a former Quant who worked for a Hedge Fund (Weapons of Math Destruction) on Wall Street will tell you what is done with your retirement money and more. The banks and companies use technology to take advantage because they can. “Of course we are going to take advantage because our tools are our brains…if they could figure out a way to take advantage of pension funds they would, a good interview with explaining smart money and dumb money.

Algorithms Shape The World

This is a very good presentation done a TED Conference and really was the one that got everyone started thinking about algorithms and today it’s talked about a lot. As he says “if you’re an algorithm, life is looking pretty good, but can’t say the same for humans”. What is a black box? Nobody has any control over the flash crash. We have moved forward a bit but still we are writing the unreadable and lost the sense of some of what is happening. Nice plug for Nanex here with research.